Gah-stronomy.
The frontroom seems to be getting quite interested in food recently, so I thought I'd start up a thread where all Orgahs could add their favourite recipes.
King Henry V's Salmon and Leek Quiche
What you need...
One large salmon steak
One leek
Three medium sized potatoes
200g mushrooms
Three large onions
One clove of garlick.
100g of salted butter
180g of plain white flour
20g of grated coconut
1 large egg
A small carton of single cream (about 1,8 dl)
Salt, pepper and sugar
Grated Cheese
One greased flan dish, roughly 9 inches wide.
To prepare the quiche
Prepare the the leek and the potatoes and boil them until done (I usually steam them, so it takes longer than usual, i.e about 15 minutes).
I find the best way to cook the salmon is just to steam it, which is very easy if you have a steamer. However, if you don't have one, you can poach it, though as I have never done the salmon that way, I'm afraid I can't help you. Steam it for ten minutes, skin side down. It is best if it slightly raw when done, as it needs to retain a suculency as it is going into the oven. Flake the salmon into pieces and put in a bowl with the vegetables.
While the vegetables and the salmon are cooking, finely chop up the onions and slice the mushrooms and garlic. Fry them in a pan with salted butter (it's just so yummy! if you can't get salted butter, add a pinch of salt). Once the mushrooms are starting to turn grey and the onions have been sweated, add 1-2 teaspoons of sugar (brown is best), or slightly more if you have sweet tooth, like me. Caramelise and add to the salmon and vegetables.
With all the above in one bowl, beat a large egg with the single cream and some pepper in a seperate bowl. Add to the vegetables and the salmon and mix together.
Now for the dough. Make a shortcurst pastry by rubbing the butter into the flour and the grated coconut (it's the special twist which makes my recipe unique, not to mention delicious) with a pinch of salt and sugar, until you get a mixture that resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add a couple of tablespoons of water and mix until you get a nice ball of dough (if too dry, add more water, if too sticky add more flour).
Roll out the dough and place in the greased flan dish. Add the salmon mixture and put in a 200C/400F preheated oven and bake for 30 minutes. After 15 minutes, sprinkle some grated cheese on top and return to the oven.
Enjoy.
Creamed Vegetables
An excellent and fairly simple way to serve vegetables other than boiling or steaming them. Works with carrots, cabbage (where it alleviates the bitterness of plain boiled cabbage), peas, leeks, or anything else you want.
To prepare:
Boil the vegetables you wish to serve until they are cooked.
For the sauce:
equal amounts of butter and flour (you may experiment with less or more if you wish)
some milk
salt, pepper, sugar and any other condiments you may wish
Melt the butter in a frying pan and then add as much flour as required until the contents ressemble a light brown paste. Then add the milk, little by little, constantly stirring with a wooden spoon, until you have a thick, creamy sauce. If too liquidy, add more flour. Season the sauce with the condiments, then place the vegetables in the frying pan with the sauce and stir in. Serve vegetables.
It is an excellent side wish with roasts.
Cauliflower cheese:
Make same sauce as above. Add 50-100 grams (or more if you wish) of grated cheese and some nutmeg and stir into the sauce until the cheese is melted. Fried bacon and onions also go well with the sauce. Take boiled cauliflower and and add to sauce. If required, put sauce and cauliflower into an oven dish, sprinkle extra grated cheese on top an put in the oven until the cheese has melted, or is turning brown.
May be served as a side dish or eaten as a main meal, as it is quite heavy.
Cinnamon Bread:
Toast a couple of slices of bread. Melt a knob of butter in a sauce pan. Ad a couple of spoons of sugar into you have a cristallised mix. Shake some cinnamon on top and stir to make a brown sauce. Pour onto to toasted bread. Also nice with bananas that have gone brown (with the bananas, you may add some warmed brandy or other alcohol and set it alight, it is then called flambéed bananas) or you can replace the sugar with honey.
Makes an excellent late afternoon snack for those with a sweet tooth, though it is not recommended to eat to many of them, for they are quite calorie-heavy.
Grandma's cucumber salad
With summer advancing, I know of no solad that is more refreshingly delicious than my grandma's cucumber salad.
What you need:
- 1 large cucumber
- an onion, preferably a spring onion, but half a fresh normal onion is also good (unfortunately I will have to make mine with a mangy old one)
- two teaspoons of salt
For the dressing:
- vinegar
- oil
- salt, pepper
- a teaspoon of honey
Take the cucumber, cut the ends off and peel it. Cut it in half. Then take a slicer (I don't know what it's really called but just something that will slice things very finely: you normally find them in metal cheese grating boards) or alternatively a small, very sharp knife, so sharp that you could shave with it (note: if you do have a knife that you have actually shaved with, don't use it. That's just disgusting). Then slice the cucumber into very fine rounds (it's easier woith a slicer, as you only have to slide the cucumber back and forht over the blade). But the cucumber into a bowl and then dump the 2 teaspoons of salt onto the cucumbers and mix. Euch! I here you exclaim. Don't worry, after half an hour you wash the salt of the cucumber with a sieve, so there's no strong salty flavour remaining. The salt takes the water out of the cucumber, and why you have to do that I don't know, but it's my grandma's recipe and if you don't like it you can stick it up your jumper.
After having washed salt off the cucumbers, rinse the bowl out and put the cucumbers back in the bowl. Finely chop up the onion and add to the bowl. Now make the dressing.
Take a cup or a mug.
Pour 2 tablespoons of vinegar and two tablespoons of oil inot the cup. Add the salt and pepper and the teaspoon of honey. Sit and add a table spoon of water. POur onto the cucumbersand onions and mix together.
Serves three.
Cheval bourguignon
This dish is normally called boeuf bourguignon, but I had some horse steaks in the freezer and I thought I would experiment. Though this may be shocking to most Brits, Yanks, Aussies and others, horse is a most delicious meat, very similar to beef, only with a tiny sweet twang and more tender. What's more, it's cheaper as well. However, horse meat is practically impossible to get in Anglophone countries, as the horse is a companion animal and it is thought that it should not be eaten (though horse meat is sometimes sold as dog food, which is hypocritical to say the least). However, it is perfectly fine to return to the more traditional beef.
Ingredients:
2 horse steaks (if using beef, try to get something like braising steak, but ordinary frying steak will do if you're in a hurry)
2 onions, sliced
150g of mushrooms, chopped
150g carrots, peeled and coarsely chopped
garlic
200ml of water
a teaspoon of powdered beef stock
half a bottle of red wine, Burgundy is best, though I used some cheapo-plonk called Syrah-Merlot.
2 tbsp flour
salt and pepper
rosemary, basil and thyme
1 tbsp of tomato paste
4 rashers of bacon, chopped
Cut up the meat into thick cubes, season with salt and pepper and place in a saucepan,casserole dish or pressure cooker. Add a large knob of butter and a touch of oil to prevent the butter from burning. Stir the meat until seared (not cooked through) and remove from the pan and put in a bowl
Add the bacon, onions, garlic and mushrooms to the saucepan. Add 2 tbsp of flour and fry to sweat the onions. Add half a bottle of red wine (you can drink the rest later), the beef stock and the water. Bring to the boil, then add the beef and carrots when simmering. Add the herbs (I used dried, but you may prefer fresh) and the tomato paste.
Now comes the point where you have to choose. When I was making this on sunday, I hadn't read the recipe the whole way through (very bad idea, I know) before cooking. So it was 9 pm and I read the next step: cook for 2-3 hours. I wasn't going to wait that long! However, I was using plain old frying steak, which doesn't take as long to cook, so I just covered the pot for an hour and let it cook.
If you are using braising steak or something similar (which is actually recommended as it will give you the tenderest meat in the end), then you have two options. Either you have a pressure cooker, so just seal it up and leave it to cook for an hour (you know how it works), or you use a casserole dish. If this case, just cover and leave for 2-3 hours.
Serve when ready with creamy mashed potato to soak up the delicious sauce (you can use white bread if you prefer).
And voilà!
And finally, one for the road, suitable even for people who can't cook.
The C.O.M.P:
Take one pint/liter/anysize glass you want.
Fill two thirds (or three quarters if you prefer) of the glass with orange juice.
Fill the other third with one part pineapple rum, one part mago rum, and one part cherry brandy.
Works well with any other fruit schnapps/brandy/alcohol you have at hand.
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Originally Posted by Gertgregoor
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